


Love (Is the Worst)

by HenryMercury



Category: Killing Eve (TV 2018)
Genre: A benevolent B & E, Canon-typical knifeplay, Domestic, Emotions, F/F, PWP (Proofreading What Proofreading), Soup, Unsuccessful kink?, soft
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-03
Updated: 2020-09-03
Packaged: 2021-03-06 23:28:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,335
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26267239
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HenryMercury/pseuds/HenryMercury
Summary: Villanelle breaks into Eve’s apartment to make soup.
Relationships: Eve Polastri/Villanelle | Oksana Astankova
Comments: 10
Kudos: 120
Collections: Killing Eve Week 2020





	Love (Is the Worst)

**Author's Note:**

> So I just found out from Twitter that Killing Eve Week is a thing! 
> 
> I'm not realistically able to catch up or write for each day this week, but I did have a little oneshotty thing in progress that I thought I could tailor and finish off for it. Since it will probably be my only contribution, we can count it against either/both of the Soft and Domestic prompts, right?

Villanelle breaks into Eve’s apartment to make soup.

“Oh god, that’s good,” Eve breathes deeply and sighs, dumping her bag and soggy umbrella by the door. She doesn’t seem at all surprised to find Villanelle here. Villanelle hates the thought that she’s become predictable—just not as much as the thought of leaving Eve alone. “What am I smelling right now?”

“Bacon bones,” Villanelle informs her helpfully.

“Maybe I _do_ love you after all.”

Villanelle hasn’t quite decided whether to let that one hurt. “I see somebody skipped lunch.”

“I ate a Kit Kat and some of Bear’s tangfastics.”

Villanelle hums, stirring the pot. “Those things are tasty, but they are not real food.”

Eve gives an amused snort. She comes up behind Villanelle and watches the motion of the wooden spoon through the fragrant, tomato-reddened liquid. Lentils and evenly-sliced vegetables swirl up to the bubbling surface. Villanelle has been following the recipe very carefully, and the results are promising this time.

“Neither is ice cream,” Eve teases, knocking her shoulder gently against Villanelle’s.

“Do you like coriander? I’ve been meaning to ask.”

“Absolutely. Do you?”

Villanelle shrugs. “I do not have strong feelings about it.”

“Everyone has strong feelings about coriander, one way or the other.”

“Not me.”

“Okay, weirdo. Shall I cut this up, then?” Eve asks, having spied the bunch of fresh leaves Villanelle brought over, just in case.

“If you can manage it.”

Eve goes quiet. “You sound almost like Niko,” she murmurs.

Suddenly desperate to ease the tension, Villanelle mimes some aggressive projectile vomiting. “Take that back!” she whines. “Please, Eve, or I may die. How could you be so cruel?”

Next there’s a metallic sound Villanelle would know anywhere. Which knife Eve has chosen to withdraw from the block, she doesn’t know—although the woman has proven herself partial to a chef’s knife. Go big or go home; that is her Eve.

“Make me,” Eve says levelly.

Villanelle pivots to find her staring, posture straight, left hand by her side and right clutching (sure enough) the chef’s knife. Watches, wordless, as Eve raises it. Spins it deftly between her fingers so that the handle points to Villanelle. She always forgets Eve butchered things in the back of a restaurant during her post-bullet sabbatical.

“What do you want me to do with this?” Villanelle cocks a brow. Pastes confidence on over her uncertainty. She knows she’s convincing, but Eve probably suspects anyway; insofar as Villanelle can be understood, Eve Polastri seems to understand her. She doesn’t touch the knife, though.

“I want you to…” Eve takes a breath, visibly steeling herself, “use it on me.”

“You want me to stab you?” Villanelle asks. Flat, emotionless—though in truth she only just keeps the quaver from her voice. “Eve, you _know_ that isn’t what I want—”

“Not—!” Eve goes loose and frantic again, eyes darting down to the floor, head shaking her hair around. “I don’t want you to _stab_ me. I just want you to… scare me a little. …foreplay.”

“ _Oh_ ,” says Villanelle.

“Yeah, _oh_.”

Villanelle wraps her fingers slowly around the knife’s wooden handle and eases it from Eve’s grip. She steps forward. Maintains eye contact. Smiles so coldly that the woman before her _shivers_.

She becomes the predator, all slow fluid movements and no hesitation. Of _course_ Eve wants to taste this side of her every so often, she reasons.

Instinctively, Eve backs away until she’s up against the bench. Villanelle brings the tip of the knife to hover a hair’s breadth from her sternum.

“This feels familiar, don’t you think?” she asks with mock cheer—and leans into Eve’s space. Breathes it in. Consumes it. Even under the pervasive smoky meat scent, she can smell _Eve_.

“Yes,” Eve replies. Her voice is just the faintest thread of a moan, carried on the gust of a held breath. It goes well beyond answering the question.

Villanelle moves fast, snatching Eve’s right hand in her left and holding it palm-down against the benchtop behind her. Eve inhales.

Villanelle turns the blade, trails the cool flat of it across Eve’s collarbone. Eve exhales. Villanelle watches the heave of her breasts. The tension in the cords of her neck—she leans forward and runs her tongue over those, hot tongue travelling right along the top edge of the knife.

“Do you think I would hurt you, Eve?” she asks. Syrupy, taunting, all an act—

“God, I—” Eve begins. Swallows audibly. “I _hope so_.”

Villanelle steps away. The knife goes clattering into the sink. She resumes stirring the soup, which now bubbles a little too spiritedly.

“V, what—” asks Eve desperately. “What did I do wrong?”

“That was not a game for you,” she remarks, not turning around. She blinks, harder than usually. “For me… Eve, I am trying _so hard not to hurt you_. I don’t _want_ to. I want to make you soup, and watch movies with you, and brush out your adorable bed hair when you’re grumpy in the mornings. I am _trying_ to love you, Eve! Why do you still not want me to?”

Staring, unfocused, at the splashback, Villanelle can see her own eyelashes clumping together. Her eyeballs are hot and they _sting_ , as if Eve’s words were onions.

Eve’s hand is hesitant on her shoulder, but gets firmer when she leans back into it.

“I’m trying,” Eve whispers. “I— I know you care about me. I haven’t doubted that for a while. And I _do_ want you to l- uh, love me. Christ, I want that so much it’s embarrassing.”

“Love is embarrassing,” Villanelle agrees sagely.

“Mortifying.”

“Really, it is the worst.”

Tugging gently, Eve coaxes Villanelle around to face her. She looks her in the (probably red, because love is terrible) eyes.

“I do, you know,” she says softly.

“What?” Villanelle asks. And she does know, but if Eve gets to see her cry then you can bet she’s going to play up the pathetic confusion angle.

“Love you. I do love you.”

Eve sighs, like she’s lost a fight by saying it. They both have, that is the thing: the fight is lost. Villanelle can’t find it anymore.

“I know,” she grins. “But thank you for saying it.”

Eve loves her, Eve finally _admitted_ that she loves her, and Villanelle can barely remember what it was like to be crying all of five seconds ago. Emotions are making her unhinged; she’s starting understand why normal people need so much therapy all the time.

Her phone beeps and buzzes obnoxiously on the bench.

“You are ruining the moment,” she grumbles accusingly as she picks it up and stops the timer. To Eve: “the soup is ready.”

“Coriander!” Eve remembers all of a sudden. “Shit, sorry.”

Villanelle shrugs. “Just bring the bunch to the table. Do you want to watch a movie after?”

“Only if I get to pick which one. Is the table set or should I grab us spoons?”

“Already set. And you cannot pick a shitty cop movie. They are not fun! They are just—”

“ _—_ procedural crap that’s not accurate anyway,” Eve finishes along with her. “Don’t worry, I was thinking horror this time.”

“That is acceptable. While we watch can I try again to braid your hair?”

Eve rolls her eyes. “Fine. But only because this soup smells so damn good.”

Villanelle spoons generous servings into two of Eve’s mismatched bowls and congratulates herself on a job well done.

“You know,” she calls through the kitchen doorway to Eve, “we can still roleplay sometimes; I am an extremely good actor and it would be a crime not to make the most of my skills. We just need to talk about it before jumping in. Set our boundaries.”

“Prior discussions? Boundaries? Who are you and what have you done with Villanelle?” Eve chuckles.

“Do you really want to know what happened to Villanelle?”

Eve returns to the kitchen. She accepts the hot bowl Villanelle passes her with a nod.

“You made her happy.”

**Author's Note:**

> Yell with me on tumblr @ henrymercury and twitter @ hhhenrymercury


End file.
